The Reykjavik Assignment (Yael Azoulay #3)(32)

Under the pile of papers on her desk was a red plastic folder. The Dying for Coltan file was thick with clippings and printouts about KZX and the Bonnet Group. Many had been added since the film was broadcast last winter. She flicked through the articles until she found the printout she was looking for, from the website of Corporationsentry. The German anticapitalist campaign organization noted that KZX’s pharmaceutical division still held the patents on a number of deadly toxins that had been developed under the Nazis. One of the poisons, according to the article, triggered cardiac arrest and then dissolved into body tissue, leaving no trace.

Najwa opened the browser on her computer, set the search result filter to “ALL LANGUAGES,” and typed in “KZX chemical weapons.” The screen filled with links, many of them in Farsi, the Iranian language, including a number of gruesome pictures of dead, blistered bodies from the Iran-Iraq War that lasted from 1980 to 1988. Saddam Hussein’s regime had used chemical weapons with abandon, not just against enemy soldiers but also against civilians, killing thousands in a gas attack on the Kurdish town of Halabja in 1988. The twentieth anniversary of the Halabja attack had triggered a new burst of media interest. Several reports, from both the German and international media, detailed how KZX had supplied Baghdad with ingredients and technology that could be used to make chemical weapons during the 1980s. The company strongly denied claims that it had facilitated the mass slaughter of the Hussein regime; Reinhardt Daintner, KZX’s head of communications, was quoted in every story, stonewalling and denying. The chemicals and equipment had been supplied solely for use in industrial and manufacturing processes for pesticides.

Najwa thought for a moment, opened a new window, and typed in “KZX poison.” The screen instantly displayed URLs for articles and television reports about environmental damage in Africa, South America, and Cambodia, where KZX had substantial investments. She clicked through the reports, lingering on a teenage boy’s account of his fourteen-hour workday mining coltan in Congo. Buried in the long list of links was a brief 2013 article from Levant Monitor, a subscription-only website that specialized in intelligence about the Middle East. The website, based in Washington, DC, was run by several former US intelligence operatives, and was well respected. Its material was unsourced, but always accurate.

Najwa nodded as she started to read. This was what she had been looking for. Hafiz Bakshari, an Iranian defector granted asylum in the United States, claimed that he had been working on a secret Iranian government program to develop a substance that would trigger a massive cardiac arrest in the victim, then break up inside the body within a few hours so it could not be detected. The poison could be administered by drops to food and drink, by spray, injection, or even by touch. Brief contact with the victim’s skin was sufficient to transfer the toxin. Bakshari said that the poison had been used on prisoners in Iranian jails who were already under death sentences, and he also admitted that he had met a German scientist who was working with the Iranians on the program to monitor the results. Bakshari could not remember the scientist’s name, but one night over dinner the scientist let slip that he had formerly worked for KZX’s research department.

Najwa entered “Hafiz Bakshari KZX” into the Start Page search engine. A handful of other specialist newsletters dealing with the Middle East had picked up on Bakshari’s claims, as did a couple of Iranian and Iraqi opposition websites. The mainstream US media had also briefly covered the affair. In response KZX stonewalled and threatened libel writs. As Bakshari could not name the German scientist or produce another witness, the story faded away. Najwa continued scrolling until she came to a story in the Washington Post that gave her a chill as she read it. A month after giving his interview, Hafiz Bakshari had been killed in a hit-and-run accident in North Dakota, where he had relocated.

*

Clarence Clairborne sat in the leather armchair in the corner of his office, a heavy leather-bound volume in his hands. The climate in the room was carefully controlled at 68 degrees Fahrenheit, and the air was automatically replaced every four hours. But his shirt was damp and creased, sticking to the back of the armchair. He forced his right leg against the floor, trying to control the twitch in his thigh.

The ceiling lights were turned down low. A cone of light from the reading lamp next to the armchair fell on the dense text, and the heavy yellow paper glowed as though it was illuminated. Clairborne glanced at the man sitting in the armchair next to his. The visitor looked like he had stepped out of a magazine advertisement promising health and wealth to financially prudent seniors. His carefully barbered white hair shone under the light of the reading lamp, and his pink skin radiated vitality. He wore blue formal trousers and a crisp, starched button-down shirt that matched his clear blue eyes.

“Clarence, what happened to your hand?” asked Eugene Packard in his rich and sonorous baritone.

Clairborne shrugged. “It’s nothing. An accident.” Samantha had come in earlier to clear up the mess but Clairborne could still smell the spilled bourbon. So could Packard, judging by the way he breathed in through his nose and the knowing expression on his face. He nodded, indicated that Clairborne should read.

Clairborne picked up the book. “And there were lightnings, and voices, and thunders …” His voice, usually a deep boom, was a weak murmur. Clairborne coughed and drank deeply from the glass of water on the side table. His leg twitched again.

Eugene Packard smiled and laid a manicured hand on Clairborne’s arm, as though he was reading his mind. “Clarence, take a breath. Slow down. We all have our own ways to get through the trials and tribulations the good Lord sends us.” He laid his fingers on the edge of the book. “This has been with us for two thousand years. It’s not going anywhere. Start again.”